Gamespot 2009 Contest
]] The Gamespot 2009 Contest, titled All Time Greatest Video Game Hero was the first character contest held on Gamespot. Due to the lack of an announcement for the next official GameFAQs Character Battle, many members of Board 8 took an interest in the contest. With a different demographic the contest became fresh as simple choices on GameFAQs became hard decisions on Gamespot and with many snubs and fodder characters people were quick to relate this to GameFAQs' original contest. Other differences to the GameFAQs contest include multiple matches occurring at the same time, matches lasting for days, a 1v1 setup, lower vote totals leading to greater chances for rallying/cheating, and a different point system that isn't so heavily weighted toward the final rounds. Huge favourites to win the tournament included Link, Solid Snake, Mario and Master Chief. The winner of the contest was Gordon Freeman who defeated Mario in the final. The official board for the contest is Board 909187272. Qualification Gamespot staff picked 54 characters to enter the contest while choosing another 24 characters for users to vote on in a massive 24-way poll. The top 10 winners would qualify for the contest. The winners were... * Nathan Drake - 13% * The Apprentice - 12% * Yoshi - 9% * Jak & Daxter - 7% * Kirby - 7% * JC Denton - 7% * Wander - 6% * Nameless One - 5% * Banjo & Kazooie - 4% * Travis Touchdown - 4% The 14 characters who did not make the cut were, in order of their final percentages, Ben, Frank West, Leisure Suit Larry, Viewtiful Joe, Maverick, Terry Bogard, Kurt Hectic, Dirk the Daring, Arthur, The Stranger, Professor Layton, The Master, Kid Chameleon, and Ulala. Snubs Notable snubs (who were not featured as one of the 54 locks or the 24 wildcards) include: * Noble Nine: Crono * High Mid-Carders: Vincent, Squall, Auron, Zelda, Sora, L-Block * Mid-Carders: Luigi, Zero, Aeris * Low Mid-Carders: Max Payne * Non-Heroes: Sephiroth, Ganon, Bowser, CATS Newcomers The Contest featured 14 characters who had never appeared in any GameFAQs Contest beforehand (plus one actual person, Bo Jackson). * Very Low Midcarders: Frogger, The Apprentice, Kyle Katarn, Liu Kang * Bad Fodder: Bonk, Nights, Dig Dug, Lester Chaykin, Garrett, Gex, Mike Haggar, Cate Archer, Nameless One, Ico Controversy Due to the lower vote totals in Gamespot's contest compared to the GameFAQs character battle, it was very possible for results to be changed from external factors. In addition, Gamespot may not have had proper voting controls in place until well into the contest. The low vote totals were the likely result of a format requiring you to scroll through a long list of matches to put in votes in all of them due to the high number of matches running at once; the first voting period had 16 matches. 4chan Controversy There was a rally on 4chan which tried to get Bub & Bob as far as possible in the contest. They defeated Master Chief and Sonic the Hedgehog under what seemed like dubious circumstances, but nothing was done about it. GameSpot may not have had proper safeguards in place at this point, but the real problem was that their average vote count is so low that it can be affected by major rallies. In the third round, Bub & Bob had nearly 16,000 votes removed after obvious cheating against Samus Aran. GameSpot noted that the votes they removed came from only 5 different people. Near the end, Team Rocket Elite began checking the vote count every 3 minutes, and said that Bub & Bob were getting hundreds (and in some cases, thousands) of votes in these intervals while Samus was getting between 10-20 votes in the same time span. (For reference, B&B were outdrawing Samus by scores of roughly 1000 vs 5 during three minute periods, and this went on for hours at a time- a streak like that was nearly unprecedented in Contest history, with the only comparison being the infamous StarCraft vs Melee match in 2004.) Steam Controversy There was a rally on Steam when Gordon Freeman was going up against Link. Valve began advertising the contest, making direct links to it within their Steam system. Afterward, Gordon Freeman's vote count shot up and Gordon Freeman beat Link by over 36,000 votes. To put the sheer number of Gordon Freeman votes into perspective, he got almost as many votes in this match as the entire vote total for Mario/Samus, held at the same time. In fact, Gordon Freeman had more votes than Bub & Bob did at the peak of their cheating. There was also significant rallying from the Valve fanbase in order to earn Gordon his wins over Snake and Mario, but the Link match was the only time Valve felt threatened enough to link the match directly from within the Steam client. Bracket Contest Bracket Division 1 Mario Kratos Mario Samus Aran Mario Gordon Freeman Gordon Freeman Mario Bonk Mario The Prince Mario Lara Croft The Prince Nights Kyle Katarn Dig Dug Kyle Katarn Lara Croft Lara Croft PaRappa Cloud Strife Lester Chaykin Cloud Strife Little Mac Cloud Strife Kratos Phoenix Wright Little Mac Pikachu Nathan Drake Pikachu Kratos Sam Fisher Kratos Division 2 Samus Aran Mega Man Master Chief Bub & Bob Bub & Bob Sonic the Hedgehog Bub & Bob Samus Aran Sonic the Hedgehog Ryo Hazuki Garrett Frogger Frogger Samus Aran Samus Aran Jade Ratchet & Clank Gex Ratchet & Clank Mega Man Mega Man Pac-Man Mega Man Mike Haggar Pac-Man Kirby Pac-Man Dante Dante Manny Calavera Division 3 Ryu Gordon Freeman Gordon Freeman Link Guybrush Threepwood Wander Wander Ryu Ryu Niko Bellic Ryu Abe Niko Bellic The Apprentice Niko Bellic Strider Hiryu Strider Hiryu Cate Archer Liu Kang Yoshi Yoshi Gordon Freeman Gordon Freeman Solid Snake Gordon Freeman Bomberman Alucard Travis Touchdown Alucard Solid Snake Solid Snake Crash Bandicoot Division 4 Duke Nukem Link Ryu Hayabusa Nameless One Ryu Hayabusa Sackboy Ryu Hayabusa Duke Nukem Sackboy Bo Jackson Leon Kennedy JC Denton Leon Kennedy Duke Nukem Duke Nukem Marcus Fenix Fox McCloud Jak & Daxter Fox McCloud Link Link Donkey Kong Earthworm Jim Link Ico Banjo & Kazooie Banjo & Kazooie Donkey Kong Raziel Donkey Kong Final X-Stats - RAW #Gordon Freeman - 50.00% #Solid Snake - 50.00% #Mario - 44.20% #Ryu - 41.00% #Link - 40.60% #Yoshi - 34.50% #Kratos - 32.53% #Cloud Strife - 31.36% #Samus Aran - 30.14% #Little Mac - 29.98% #Pikachu - 29.28% #Earthworm Jim - 28.74% #Niko Bellic - 28.45% #Bub & Bob - 28.28% #Sonic the Hedgehog - 27.99% #Duke Nukem - 26.55% #Master Chief - 26.30% #The Prince - 25.90% #Mega Man - 25.68% #The Apprentice - 25.55% #Liu Kang - 25.46% #Bomberman - 25.40% #Phoenix Wright - 23.98% #Lara Croft - 23.34% #Nathan Drake - 22.95% #Sam Fisher - 21.86% #Leon Kennedy - 20.76% #Ryu Hayabusa - 19.49% #Wander - 19.11% #Marcus Fenix - 18.75% #Pac-Man - 18.54% #Kirby - 18.54% #Alucard - 18.10% #Strider Hiryu - 17.98% #Guybrush Threepwood - 17.77% #Abe - 17.55% #Dante - 16.43% #Donkey Kong - 15.43% #Crash Bandicoot - 14.60% #Lester Chaykin - 14.24% #Ratchet & Clank - 13.77% #Kyle Katarn - 12.84% #Sackboy - 12.79% #Fox McCloud - 12.59% #Frogger - 11.88% #JC Denton - 11.84% #Ryo Hazuki - 11.53% #Manny Calavera - 10.78% #Cate Archer - 10.54% #Garrett - 10.40% #Jade - 10.01% #Raziel - 9.41% #Travis Touchdown - 9.16% #Nameless One - 8.54% #Dig Dug - 8.32% #Jak & Daxter - 7.95% #Bo Jackson - 7.54% #Gex - 7.13% #Mike Haggar - 6.88% #Banjo & Kazooie - 6.05% #PaRappa - 4.62% #Nights - 4.40% #Ico - 3.96% #Bonk - 3.54% External Links * Official Contest Site * Board Odds Project Results Category:Off-Site Contests